You are here

Doug Massey

Why Is International Migration Increasing And Why Is Residential Segregation So Harmful?

By the late 20th century, every developed country had become an immigrant-receiving society, drawing migrants primarily from the developing world. Return to Aztlan focused on the social mechanisms promoting and sustaining emigration from Mexico to the United States. Worlds in Motion: Understanding International Migration at the End of the Millennium developed a theoretical synthesis to account for immigration. Beyond Smoke and Mirrors: Mexican Immigration in an Age of Economic Integration used the same theoretical framework to analyze the history of Mexico-U.S. migration, offer a critique of past U.S. policies, and suggest avenues for future reform.

African Americans are uniquely segregated in American cities, and since the publication of American Apartheid, I have been working on the consequences of segregation for African Americans and Latinos of African ancestry. Segregation figured prominently in explanations for black underachievement in the Source of the River, and it interacts with shifts in the U.S. income distribution to yield a rising concentration of poverty that, in turn, intensifies social disorder and violence that undermines the health of African Americans, reduces their life expectancy, and impairs their cognitive development.